Culture Watch

The Brethren by John Grisham
Island Books, Dell Publishing, a division of Random House 440 pages, $7.99

Sometimes a book takes on a new interest when it is read several years after publication. A case in point is John Grisham's novel, The Brethren, which was copyrighted in 2000. The events of 9/11 give the book an added impact.

It isn't that The Brethren is prophetic. It isn't. There is no act of terrorism on American soil and the presidential election it touches on is a landslide, not the squeaker that put George Bush in the White House. But still...

The Brethren has a double plot. It opens with the brethren – three former judges serving time in a North Florida federal penitentiary. One is in as the result of drunken drive that led to the death of two people; another is there for tax evasion; and the third is in for a sleazy little operation involving bingo profits. The three take over the prison's law library, hold court to settle disputes among the other inmates, occasionally file appeals for fellow prisoners, and run a nifty little blackmail operation.

The other plot involves a presidential election. The Director of the CIA handpicks a Congressman to be the next president and gives him a campaign issue – the need for the United States to rebuild its military. In short order, Congressman Aaron Lake is hip deep in primaries, campaign appearances, and money rolling in. His largely single-issue campaign is given added impetus by several terrorist events – events that the CIA knew were in the offing but deliberately did nothing to prevent. It irritates the CIA director that people think his organization is inept, but that's the price for getting his man elected.

The two plots come together when an act of stupidity committed by Congressman Lake prior to his selection by the CIA makes him a blackmail victim of the brethren. The CIA is, of course, watching Lake like the hawk they've set him up to be, and they get wind of the problem before he does. The machinations of the CIA become fascinatingly Machiavellian.

It's virtually impossible to read this book now without wondering just a little how much the CIA really knew about the events of September 11 and what hidden agendas might be buried in files no one will even see. A touch of paranoia there? Definitely. But as someone once noted, "Just because you're paranoid doesn't mean they aren't out to get you."

If you missed The Brethren when it first came out, pick up a copy and see where your imagination takes you.

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Laura W. Haywood is a graduate of Finch College. Her career includes representing newspapers for national advertising when she was the only woman repping papers in New York at the time. Stints in public relations and development followed at Jacksonville and Princeton Universities as well as one in public relations for a major corporation. Laura's fiction and poetry has won a number of prizes and has appeared in The New York Times ("Metropolitan Diary"), Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine, Galaxy, Isaac Asimov's Science Fiction Magazine, and a number of other magazines and anthologies. She edited or co-edited (with Isaac Asimov) two science fiction and one mystery anthology. Laura is the author of the recently published novel "The Honor of the Ken."

Laura can be reached by email: lwhaywood@aol.com